You know you have PTSD when..

thankyou Terry (:


Stress has such a major impact on memory and eyewitness accounts.. the general idea is that we need a certain amount of stress (but not too much), to optimise our performance for anything.
I think for us here, it's likely that we got so used to stress, and raised adrenaline levels, that we need a much higher amount of stress than most people, to tip us over the edge, and make us unable to perform properly.

If you're interested, check out something called the Yerkes-Dodson law.. explains it a bit better than I can.

TheCastleOf wrote:When ...

You're stressed out of your mind on vacation and it's not even work related.

Yep.. and when you view going to work as having a break..






(I should probably have titled this thread ''you know you have c-PTSD when..''
meh)

seabreezeblue wrote:Yep.. and when you view going to work as having a break..

at this point, we might as well give ourselves a good reason to be stressed!

seabreezeblue wrote:I think for us here, it's likely that we got so used to stress, and raised adrenaline levels, that we need a much higher amount of stress than most people, to tip us over the edge, and make us unable to perform properly.

I feel that way as well.

TheCastleOf wrote:
at this point, we might as well give ourselves a good reason to be stressed!

Definitely (:

At this point though I'm overdoing it by going out to dinner


You know you have c-PTSD when..

You go out for dinner and spend the entire time feeling severely dissociated.. you feel far too exposed even with the wall right next to you, and the lighting being nice and dim.

You feel like crap for half the day, for literally no reason at all - no cause, just flashbacks felt like you were enjoying your day too much.

You're so focused on trying to act ''normal'' that when the pizza delivery guy says ''enjoy your food'', you automatically reply in a cheerful tone ''and you!''.. and then mentally slap yourself for the next few minutes for sounding so dumb.

You can't manage to focus your brain narrowly enough to not take in the feelings of the thousand people that you pass by at the train station.. so you have to decompress in the restroom for 10mins before feeling like you're at least somewhat in control and occupying your body again.

Are you also a Highly Sensitive Person, Seabreezeblue ?

seabreezeblue wrote:You're so focused on trying to act ''normal'' that when the pizza delivery guy says ''enjoy your food'', you automatically reply in a cheerful tone ''and you!''.. and then mentally slap yourself for the next few minutes for sounding so dumb.

I think it's cute, maybe he thought that was cute too.

Sorry you didn't enjoy your dinner. Those little moments, they do bring joy. And you deserve to be able to appreciate them.

Not exactly..

I've read a fair bit about HSPs.. and some of it fits, some of it doesn't.

I've got Aspergers, and we fall into roughly two groups; those that don't pick up enough.. and those that pick up way too much. I fall into the picking up way too much category.
Combine that with the hypervigilance of c-PTSD, and the result is really really difficult at times. On a good day I can walk into a crowded room, and block most of it out, but if I'm tired or flashbacky.. or hypervigilant, I'm going to have a really bad day.

I don't know how much of my ability to read people is natural, and how much is learned - a result of hundreds of hours spent observing to keep myself safe.. all I do know is that I know exactly how someone is feeling with a quick glance - and when i'm hypervigilant, I can't turn off the emotion reading/analysing.. I do it for every single person that goes past.

lol, it's so not cute.. it's face-palmingly =
but hey.. I've done it plenty of times now so I might as well just shake my head and smile.. it will happen again


(and just so I don't take this topic totally off course and have to mod myself..)

You know you have c-PTSD when you think a cupboard would be a great place to sleep in..

When you spend most nights putting off going to sleep.. (yep.. looking at you 01:49am )

You're pretty sure you know how disconcerting it would be to be teleported.. because your flashbacks sometimes make you feel like you've quickly been pulled somewhere else, and then thrown back again.. leaving you with a slight sense of dizziness, along with the other fun stuff.

When you can't understand why people moan so much about having flu, when you just get on with your day as usual.
Then in later years it knocks you over, and even though you feel awful, it's kind of nice to have that as your biggest problem at the moment.

seabreezeblue wrote:


(and just so I don't take this topic totally off course and have to mod myself..)

When you can't understand why people moan so much about having flu, when you just get on with your day as usual.

when you break two fingers hammer throwing tape them up with a Popsicle stick and go lifting the next day taking a group of tissues so you can mop up the blood that dripped down while gripping the bar.. yew..I can't believe I did that, but at the time it was so normal to me

or better one .. when you have stacked the 10 kg plates so you can do deficit dead lifts and you get a drink of water and when you come back someone has taken some of them .. and in the ensuing discussion you explode and almost manage to kick over the squat rack because they fail to see your own point of view..

the fact that you can lift in a gym for almost 10 years and no one enters into a discussion with you, even though you are always very polite very careful, not loud, etc..(and I only tried to knock over that rack once)

or that at the end of the day you go back training in your own garage by yourself ..

seabreezeblue wrote:I've got Aspergers, and we fall into roughly two groups; those that don't pick up enough.. and those that pick up way too much. I fall into the picking up way too much category.

I had never heard about the latter, that's interesting ...

Terry E. wrote:when you break two fingers hammer throwing tape them up with a Popsicle stick and go lifting the next day taking a group of tissues so you can mop up the blood that dripped down while gripping the bar.. yew..I can't believe I did that, but at the time it was so normal to me

TheCastleOf wrote:

that was my feeling as well..

Hugs Terry.. weird how we look back on stuff we found normal at the time, and we see it in such a different way now.

Nowhere near as bad as yours, but I skidded on a patch of ice when i was 10 and riding my bike to the swimming pool. I sliced my chin right open, and sat on the pavement trying to stem the bleeding for about 15 minutes.
I thought i'd sorted it pretty well, so went to go swimming.. walked into the centre, got changed, my chin was bleeding a bit by the time I was ready (the warmth of being inside had made it start up again), so I asked the attendant for a plaster. yep, didn't work out that well.
He wouldn't give me a plaster, and insisted on calling my parents to collect me and take me to hospital.. needed 12 stitches
Really disappointed that i didn't get to go swimming.. was so cross with that attendant after that that i stopped saying hi to him like i usually did..

TheCastleOf wrote:I had never heard about the latter, that's interesting ...

It's generally seen more in females on the spectrum, but a fair amount of males also say the same thing.. (part of the intense world theory of autism..)
it's also the reason why many females get misdiagnosed with BPD when they actually have aspergers/HFA.


You know you have PTSD when..

Sedatives at the dentist don't work on you the way they're meant to.. all other patients walk slowly out being heavily supported by a friends arm.. and you walk out as though you were never given it in the first place.

(linked in to the swimming one in a tangental way)..

When you have at least 10 different ways of getting money and food, and can pick a simple door lock like you're a burglar..

(and yep.. guess who got screamed at and questioned for hours about where the money for swimming came from?.. so ashamed looking back on some of that now )

seabreezeblue wrote:



When you have at least 10 different ways of getting money and food, and can pick a simple door lock like you're a burglar..

(and yep.. guess who got screamed at and questioned for hours about where the money for swimming came from?.. so ashamed looking back on some of that now )

I think that is the CA one. At the time I am guessing you did not think your behaviour wrong ??

I wonder what you feel the people who know you now but know none of your history would believe if you told them all that. Especially the other skills you acquired ?? My sons find it very hard to understand how I went through what I did and appear so normal.

Makes you realise how many people go through this crap and keep it nicely hidden, as we all know the impact that showing it has on us socially.

Oh you are going to love this one.

Back when I was starting my accounting business I would chase any lead.

One night I am talking to a guy who had a 1/2 share in a security company. The silent partner was Roger Rogerson, a crooked cop implicated in a string of high profile drug murders.

Anyway after pitching for his business, I walked out thinking... hmm this could be awkward, as I already had clients in the Black Uhlans, Mobshitters, and Gypsy Jokers.

In Sydney at the time the bike gangs ran amphetamines and the cops ran heroin. (true story).

I was thinking ... hmmm better make sure that neither side knew I was working with the other.

It was then the light globe went off and I realized I was a little out of control.

Told my son that story recently and he struggled to get his head around his father doing all that.

Oblivious to risk and danger although how much is PTSD and how much is CA I cannot say.